Posted
by
kdawson
on Thursday September 23, 2010 @08:29AM
from the no-problem dept.

schliz writes "Free software activist Richard Stallman has called for the end of the 'war on sharing' at the World Computer Congress in Brisbane, Australia. He criticized surveillance, censorship, restrictive data formats, and software-as-a-service in a keynote presentation, and asserted that digital society had to be 'free' in order to be a benefit, and not an attack. Earlier in the conference, Stallman had briefly interrupted a European Patent Office presentation with a placard that said: 'Don't get caught in software patent thickets.' He told journalists that the Patent Office was 'here to campaign in favor of software patents in Australia,' arguing that 'there's no problem that requires a solution with anything like software patents.'"

The notion of "extremism" is based on the notion that majority always represent somewhat "middle", "balanced" or "common-sensical" or "best" or etc. position, while in fact majority always represents just the most marketed, the most advertised, the most imposed position. That is for situations when wide public is involved.

For example, in my mind, a government that locks non-violent human beings in cages for engaging in recreational drug use is incredibly extremist. The reason the majority doesn't see it that way is because they've spent their entire lives knowing nothing but the status quo, and therefore can't imagine it being any different.

while in fact majority always represents just the most marketed, the most advertised, the most imposed position.

[emphasis mine]

OK, as a first approximation, you are right, but to say "always" is to overstate the case. There is no question that people who invest in propaganda don't do so out of naiveté... they expect a return on their investment. They expect to wield public sentiment like a tool, but it is a treacherous tool.

I think propaganda works best when it is directs people's attention away from their day to day lives, as opposed to changing their assessment of those lives. You can say, "your life is hell because of the Jews" or "you are insecure because of the homosexual agenda." You can't say, "your life is actually pretty good so far as the world standard of living is concerned," even if that is true. You can't say "it's actually quite easy to get a job; people who don't have jobs are just lazy," unless you are talking to somebody with a secure job.

If you could simply manufacture the opinions you wanted, then the public would have continued to favor the Iraq war in the run up to the 2008 elections, but the war had gone on so long that people were touched by it in some way, by a family member, friend or colleague who was deployed and maybe didn't come back. Likewise the Democrats are going to pay in 2010 because they can't credibly claim to have improved peoples' lives in the twenty months they've had power. That's common in mid-term elections.

In such cases, propaganda has a way of turning on its masters.

Perhaps we should evaluate people's political sanity not on their absolute position on some political axis, but on their open or narrow mindedness. A political position becomes pernicious fantasy, no matter where it is on your favorite philosophical axis, when it willfully ignores the probable outcomes of the actions it advocates.

For example, other people with me on the left favored single payer health insurance or even a socialized medical system during the recent debates on health insurance reform. While I am philosophically well disposed to these things, I did not favor them at that time. I thought if they were enacted that existing businesses would immediately collapse, and that working public replacements could not be conjured into existence quickly enough to take their place. Now I realize many who prefer socialized medicine or single payer (not the same things at all by the way) might disagree with that assessment. They may even be right. But that's not the point I'm trying to make. I moderated my position based on a critical examination of the likely outcomes of my *ideal* solution. That examination might be faulty, but I did not twist my evaluation of the facts in order to justify my a priori position.

It's tricky to evaluate the political sanity of a figure like Stallman. He is very, very bright,and bright people have a way of finding credible sounding rationalizations for really ill considered opinions. That said, I think that Stallman's positions on the viability of free software sound a lot more credible today than they did twenty years ago. True, free software projects haven't produced viable competition in a number of important niches; but after two decades of experience with free software success, it isn't so hard to believe that a free software ecosystem could meet all the software needs of an individual or enterprise.

Well, I think that all extremists should be killed to ensure that the debate remains moderate! Oh, wait...

It's also worth mentioning that if you immediately dismiss all extremists, you limit the debate to those ideas which the powers that be have deemed "mainstream" and acceptable. Extremists are the ones that change what is considered mainstream.

Who says they don't? Only stat I've heard on that was that 95% of muslims denounce AlQuaeda (the other 5% being the crazies). I've heard this sentiment a lot and it makes me sad. What is different between the parent's statement and this one:

"Did Glenn Beck rape and murder a young girl in 1990? We're not saying he's guilty, but he won't deny it!"

It's good to hear about 9/11. Now, how many Muslims denounce death penalty for apostasy?

Pretty much all of them. - I mean have you ever asked a muslim what he thought about it?Really, the only ones who do care are the fundos and the politicians who pander to them.The koran has just two passages that deal with the issue and in each case the death penalty is only applicable to apostates who then commit treason.Just in case you've forgotten, we still have the death penalty for treason in the US.Hell, the only reason we still have the death penalty for anything in the US is because the politicians who pander to american fundos.No other western country has the death penalty. Even Russia abolished it.

But if you have to have big names say it - lets start with Muhammad Sayyid Tantawi [sunnah.org] - Grand Mufti of the leading islamic university, Al-Azhar. If islam were anywhere near as monolithic as the catholic church then the grand mufti of Al-Azhar would be the closest thing islam has to a pope. And it wasn't something new that he brought with him when the took office in 1996 - the previous Grand Mufti al-Shaltut held to similar doctrine.

Many of them do. Many of those that do are still demonized by Fox News - for instance, Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf said in describing his community center in Lower Manhattan that “We want to push back against the extremists", has worked with local Jewish leaders, and has been consistently advocating for peace between Islamic nations and the West throughout his career. It didn't help his cause.

I don't know... I have many arguments to oppose to extremists (on my side or against my side) but I don't like to call RMS an extremist because his views and positions are coherent, rational and come with arguments. He is uncompromising, that's sure, but does that make one an extremist ?

Uncompromising, sure. Idealist, hell yes, but extremist ? How so ? Does he advocate violence ? Does he say we must break laws ? Come one... I like RMS in that he doesn't care about what is reasonable, what is consensual, he cares about his point and defends it.

His uncompromising attitude on issues which cannot be resolved without compromise make him an extremist. There is no possible way we'll ever live in a world of pure free software in Stallman's lifetime. He can never win. Any reasonable outside observer can see this. The work he wants to do is the work of decades or even centuries spent readjusting attitudes and gaining mindshare. He could move things in that direction if he were willing to take small bites, make compromises here and there to advance th

Wrong, extremism is hardly the same thing as being at the extreme of a distribution.

It implies a group which has chosen to remove itself from discourse because the views were not going far enough and could not be changed via socially acceptable means. A brilliantly clear example is the Tea Party movement. They've chosen not to make a good faith effort at public debate in favor of more extreme tactics to get their way. It's not the fact that they want a more extreme party platform which makes them extremi

I don't think anyone has any issues with Stallman sharing his own work voluntarily - I think some people draw the line at stunts like this where he calls for universal adherence to his third and fourth 'freedoms' (to distribute the software; and to modify and distribute modified copies of the code).

Your post assumes that only the black and white extremes exist - nothing could be further from the truth, luckily. There is a whole world in between the two.

Stallman is not advocating that you be forced to adhere to the beliefs of the FSF. The GPL is a voluntary license based on copyright. Software patent advocates would like their beliefs to become legal everywhere, forcing everyone to comply with them.

An extreme view on copyright or patents would be a demand for their immediate dissolution. Software patents are a relatively recent legal phenomenon recognized in only some countries. Arguing against them is far from extreme.

There's a difference. Patent advocates are in the business of conspiring against the public to line their own pockets. The FSF represents public interests and has nothing to hide. Crashing the patent troll party makes a much more powerful statement, imo.

There's a difference. Patent advocates are in the business of conspiring against the public to line their own pockets. The FSF represents public interests and has nothing to hide.

Not saying I'm for or against software patents, but you do realize that "patent advocates" are citizens of the public, too, right? And that owners of corporations are citizens? They have exactly as much right as the FSF to argue what the interests of the public are.

Patent advocates represent their corporations, because it is the corporations that own the patents, not the advocates themselves. Corporations are legal persons but are not citizens. There is no equivalence there.

Sure it's a job but I don't hear MS speaking-out for the rights of janitors. Often they do just the opposite.... citation?

I just can't imagine a press release wherein any corporation comes out and says: "We think janitors have too many rights. Less rights would be good." That's a stretch even for Walmart to admit. Essentially, I think you've said something fairly ridiculous as though it were obviously true.

There is a problem currently with laws that were written with humans in mind, being interpreted to cover corporations.

For example; California's property tax reform a few decades back, was written to protect older citizen's from being taxed out of their family homes. It limits the amount your property tax can go up, unless you sell your property or perform a major upgrade. Now, however, there is a problem. Corporations also own property, but quite often they never sell it or transfer it... and they don't die of old age. There is simply no mechanism in place to allow Corporations to have the value of their property reassessed on a periodic basis to adjust their property tax to reflect current value.

Whether this is good or bad is not the point. The point I am making is that corporations are not human beings and thus laws written for human beings might not work as intended when applied to corporations.

Saying "humans are part of corporations" makes about as much as sense as saving "humans are part of slave plantations" or "huans are part of prisons". While all three statements are technically true, neither the corporations nor the plantation nor the prison is representing the workers within. On the contrary these THINGS typically work to suppress the humans inside their boundaries.

The workers should be allowed to exercise their rights (voting, free speech, etc) while the corporate plantation has none

Is a patent advocate advocating patents as a member of the public (i.e., thinking about the common good), or in a different capacity (e.g., patent lawyer, businessman, or someone else with vested interests who would benefit personally from patents)? In this instance, I believe patent advocates are only looking out for themselves, and are working against the interests of the public -- so it's fair and prudent to set them apart. As for the FSF (and EFF etc), I don't see them trying to profit from their activi

"...I thought that what was good for our country was good for General Motors, and vice versa."

--Charles Wilson, then President of General Motors[emphasis mine]

This snippet is often misquoted "What's good for General Motors is good for the country." But the literal misquoting is probably accurately characterized as a paraphrase, because the idea is embedded there, and I think a lot of people take it seriously.

I completely disagree with that philosophy. Adversity for corporations (i.e., lack of monopolies, fierce competition etc) is good for the public, but potentially bad for their shareholders. Cozy monopolies and lack of competition is good for corporations (who get to set their own price-points and don't need to invest and innovate), but obviously bad for the public.

The vast majority of people aren't shareholders, so by making life easy for corporations you are taking money away from the many and giving it to

Even under favorable conditions for a corporation, shareholders may not see much benefit. The sort of leadership that schemes for unfair advantage by encouraging uncritical reporting by the mainstream media, regulatory capture, rent seeking, tax breaks, and the like isn't going to be fair to shareholders either. With collusion from the board that they packed with "friends", they'll cheerfully pay themselves huge bonuses that come straight off the value of the stock, and brag about how deserving they are.

Money doesn't just magically appear on the market : if you gain money through your stocks , it's because someone else is losing money.

That's actively ludicrous. If I gain money on my stocks, it's because I sold them to a willing buyer for more than I paid for them. If I don't sell them, then the daily price fluctuations are simply figures on paper. Nobody is losing money, although the person to whom I sell is certainly spending money. If your argument is that my gain is potential money lost by the pers

As long as those "citizens" have only as much right to put forth their views as Stallman, and not, say, a couple of dozen legislators in their pockets, I might just agree there.

Considering, however, that they tend to spam the entire argument, and then use undue influence to enact measures that are only in their own selfish interests, and detrimental to the general common good, I give them much less benefit of the doubt.

"They have exactly as much right as the FSF to argue what the interests of the public are."

I don't think anybody would argue that point, but you seem to be ignoring the fact that they are not arguing for public interest. That is merely the lie that they are telling, while they argue what is in the best interest of a select few rich people.

There is no equivalence there. Stallman's cause is just. Theirs is greed.

While I agree with you, it is just a matter of perspective. There is nothing inherently good about information being "free" aside from the benefits that people will receive from the information. Some people have an interest in keeping information closed.

Hopefully when more people think like us than think like them we can get our way. Not that our way is somehow the "right" way, just that it works for us.

Consumption of information? That common expression bothers me more and more. How can information be "consumed"? Energy and food is consumed. I suppose what is really meant is that, barring forgetfulness, information is only new once. The newness is "consumed", not the information itself. But that expression is too easily misconstrued. It lays a foundation for reasoning as if information is scarce, which is not true. Stop using it!

Today, proprietary cannot compete with open. Open has far too many advantages. If not for the religious devotion so many display towards proprietary systems, the intense desire for there to be entities who will act in a manner proper and reassuring to those who have stakes of their own, libre software would have won by now.

You do understand that your comments are opinions, right? The proprietary model does have advantages as well, such as providing additional incentive to create software. Even Stallman admits that proprietary software has benefits, but that choosing Free Software is a moral imperitive. Any increased efficiency is just a byproduct of following that moral path.

It is clearly debatable whether free or proprietary software provides the most benefit for society. Its okay that you have taken a side, but don't pret

I'd suggest going to a F/OSS event in an area with a depressed economy. Someone could shout out that and criticism of patents is an offense again America and Jesus and you won't hear a word. They just want a job from the well connected guy at the podium.

"Right, because a patent troll interrupting a FSF convention would be viewed as just as legitimate."

I agree that it would not be taken as the same and acceptable, but that is because most people don't think that what is good for the rape survivor is good for the rapist. You are basically asserting there is something wrong with finding it OK for a rape survivor to speak out about rape while simultaneously not finding it OK for a rapist to show up and speak about the wonderful benefits of raping people. Yes

I'd prefer Stallman's outspoken extremism vs the quiet extremism that corporations would place us under if no one spoke up.

Right, because a patent troll interrupting a FSF convention would be viewed as just as legitimate.

By what possible contortion of reality would that be true? Your premise seems to be be that Stallman's rationale is possessed of equal merit to that of the patent troll, a premise that is rather far from "given".

I don't agree -- for doing something to require balls, you have to be risking something to do it. Oh, no! Now that Stallman's taking this gutsy stance, someone might think he's some kind of crazed free software loving hippie! Well, most people probably would think that, if they knew who he was.

That's not to say that I disagree with his viewpoint, but the man risks nothing in doing this.

Amazingly enough, the article describing Stallman's well-reasoned arguments for the need for free software, free sharing of information, and non-proprietary formats is helpfully on a page written in ASP.

Ugh. People like you make me sick! The DMCA protects authors and their intellectual property that is in an infinite supply, and the ACTA, if it passes (hopefully it will), will accomplish this goal further and eliminate those evil pirates who dare steal profit that only exists in the future of an alternate dimension where the artist made more money!

Censorship, DRM, and surveillance are all very dangerous and annoying things that only hurt the average person. It's hardly going to affect the pirates and will likely only affect 'normal' people, robbing them of some of their rights in the process. These corporations must be stopped, that much is clear.

Even worse than software patents, there is a new UN resolution going around [npr.org] that would give world governments more control over the internet. This is even worse, IMO, than software patents, which "only" threaten to drive software innovation to a virtual standstill: allowing governments to control the flow of information on the Internet could well destroy it, and the newfound freedom of expression and access to information we are currently taking for granted.

There are so many new threats to freedom on so many new fronts it's hard to even define what they all are, let alone what can be done about them.

What are you hiding? If you're not a dirty criminal, what have you got to lose? The government is nice enough to provide all kinds of other things for you, and can be trusted. Stop acting like a conspiracy theorist.

I think the Internet's fate is sealed, in it's current form. It was always under the control of a single government, so it's only a matter of time. We need to go to darknets or replace the infrastructure with something community-run - probably a bit of both.

If that's this morning's Morning Edition report on "cyber" security (may that buzzword burn in hell), we need to change the framing of the information security debate in eastern Europe and the Middle East, because those countries view information and ideology, not technology, as the weapons. They want to stop countries from expressing philosophical opinions, which is useless for anything except for suppressing dissidents!

What concerns me about that is that they're going at it the wrong way. Much of what governments legitimately require is already available to them. The main thing they need is some agreement about how to investigate and prosecute cross border crimes.

Spammers, Phishers and similar scum routinely go through multiple countries for a reason, and it's not just a matter of the net not being designed to go directly at all times either.

Shouting, running, making a fool out of himself. I think if only he would do the sort of things he does without calling a ruckus, then people might take him more seriously.

I admire the sort of things he's doing, but the way he does them is troublesome. He shouldn't for example be blocking access to an Apple store despite their terribly non-free products. Nobody likes an asshole and would tend to ignore it. Now, if he were to stand outside, offering leaflets on why Apple is wrong, but disguising it as something like "Bad Computer Practises", or "Why Software Freedom is Important" instead of "Apple is crap! Don't buy from them!" which no one will pay attention to, I think he'd get a lot further.

"The bitch of it is that you probably did the right thing. But you did it in the wrong way. In the inconvenient way. Now you have to pay the penalty for that. I know it stinks, but that's the way it is."
President Susanna Luchenko to Sheridan, Rising Star, Babylon 5

Shouting, running, making a fool out of himself. I think if only he would do the sort of things he does without calling a ruckus, then people might take him more seriously.

May be he doesn't care about being taken seriously. May be he just wants people to be serious about defending their own right to free expression. And I am sorry for people who are turned away from his lucid arguments because they think that non-violent protests against economic oppression and political censorship are "extremism": can people be any more docile?

May be he doesn't care about being taken seriously. May be he just wants people to be serious about defending their own right to free expression

The problem is, by projecting the image of himself that he does - a bearded fanatic with glowing eyes frothing at the mouth - he does a great disservice to the cause he tries to represent, because it gets associated with him, and all personal negative connotations necessarily carry over.

PR is good and necessary for any cause, but it should be done by people good at it.

In other words, if he would just keep his mouth shut, not make anyone uncomfortable, and not live out his philosophy, he would be acceptable to you. Get back to us when you've done even _an eighth_ of what RMS has done for software freedoms that all of us benefit directly from.

bought about the creation of the middle class, modern democracy, and the death of the feudal system and the aristocracy

it took awhile. the feudal system and the aristocracy in their time were just no brainer common sense, and the idea of challenging them was either something to be laughed at or you must be crazy to believe they could ever end or to doubt their validity

the internet means the death of the entire concept of intellectual property

it will take awhile. in our time some people just take the idea of intellectual property as just no brainer common sense, and the idea of challenging it is either something to be laughed at or you must be crazy to believe it could ever end or to doubt its validity

in today's age, stallman is but a distant voice in the wilderness, but he's actually 100% correct, just way ahead of his time, too far ahead, to gain any traction

the simple truth is that intellectual property is a completely flawed concept. it made sense before the internet when media had to be physically printed and physically distributed. much as the feudal system made sense when only a few could afford book knowledge

all that intellectual property has going for it now is legal and cultural inertia. it is of course completely philosophically untenable when media can be shared at zero cost at great distances with millions instantaneously. it will take time, but intellectual property is going down the tubes. the intartubes

Company X spends $1B developing a new idea, be it a physical widget or an algorithm. Said company sells widgets or software licenses at $A to recoup the invested money (first) and then to make a profit. Company Y sees the widget or software and can cheaply reverse engineer it, skipping 70% of the development costs. Company Y can sell their product at 0.4*$A and still make profit. Company X only gets $0.2B revenue for the item, and is out $0.8B.

How much time, effort and money does it take to design the iPod, and set up the facilities to manufacture it in large quanities? How much time, effort and money does it take to replicate the design and set up the facilities to manufacture it in large quantities?

Not surprisingly, the answers to both questions are very similar -- it takes a lot of time, effort and money even if you are simply copying somebody else's product. By the time a second company can produce "iPots", Apple would have had ample time to

You are ignoring several things that usually happen. First off, Company X, being first to market, will likely enjoy better sales even if their product cost more because of name recognition. Being first to market can be a huge boost for any product, and can do an effective job holding off cheap clones. Second, if Company X keeps innovating with their product and doesn't just keep selling said widget as the same product, they will always have an advantage because everyone is constantly playing catch up. W

bought about the creation of the middle class, modern democracy, and the death of the feudal system and the aristocracy

Completely incorrect and bass-ackwards. Wikipedia on the printing press [wikipedia.org]: "The rapid economic and socio-cultural development of late medieval society in Europe created favorable intellectual and technological conditions for Gutenberg's invention", not the other way around as you state. Gutenberg invented the press in 1439, nearly three hundred years before the industrial revolution. [wikipedia.org]

Too bad your misunderstanding of history detracts so badly from the better points in your comment.

if you can't afford a book, you can't afford to learn. and you can't afford a book if the only ones around are scribbled by monks. and so, a dummy, who can't read and knows nothing, you go work the fields, like your serf parents before you

fact: the printing press created the middle class as we know it today. the existence of a large middle class supports the notion of a democracy being an effect political possibility

the cities have always had craftsmen and tradesmen, since before roman and even egyptian tim

apologies: i meant intellectual property in regards to only one kind of intellectual property: media

anything that is consumed as electronic bits: books, music, movies, should be completely devoid of any intellectual property conventions

but information that is not consumed electronically, that is, information that describes the creation of real world technologies: yes, that should continue to enjoy intellectual property law protections, because it concerns real world effort and expense

apologies: i meant intellectual property in regards to only one kind of intellectual property: media

anything that is consumed as electronic bits: books, music, movies, should be completely devoid of any intellectual property conventions

But that system will never work. Anyone that produces those kinds of media will never put it into electronic formats if they will lose their ability to make money of off it. Your system would encourage content producers to limit themselves to archaic copy-protected distribution models, and potentially large segments of society will never be able to see the cultural benefit of their work.

Some level of reasonable IP protection has to be in place to allow content producers the ability to generate content.

the future is the death of content producers. and by that i mean old school distributors. artists will produce directly, with financial outlays coming from passion. if it ignites in popularity, ancillary revenues: personalized content, concert gigs, cinema houses: these will provide a return on investment. and this does not mean we are forced to watch amateur youtube videos in the future. one of the most most expensive, and most profitable movie, ever m

meanwhile i can give you copy of the movie avatar. the simple pattern of bits that make up the movie rquires no real world involvement, the bits can be enjoyed in and of themselves on a computer monitor. this is a different kind of "intellectual property" because the idea itself is also the product

Suppose it weren't an actual copy of the film "Avatar" - let's say it was just the script.

Now, as people seem to be very fond of pointing out - there's not a lot to it. Basic premise, rehashed story, Mulan/Ferngully/yada yada. What makes the movie is its presentation... The quality of the graphics and how well they're animated, the voice, sound, and music work, and so on. All of these things together represent a tremendous amount of "real world" work, and it's that real world work that's made this "simp

You have a crucial point that you fail to see: those two forms of IP are already distinguished in legal institutions: copyright and patents. the problem, is that both legal institutions are being extended out of control... but the difference is there, and we only need to adjust one (patents) and abolish the other.But independently of that particular solution, the fact that technological development makes some particular form of social institution or enterprise obsolete is not the problem. If the invention o

Are you seriously arguing that African countries are the way they are because they have no IP laws?? As for China, I think they are innovating just fine, and in a few years they might give us a run for our money.

No, we need IP laws and the lack of them will bring innovation to a standstill.

You have it all wrong: for example James Watt [mises.org] brought the development of the steam machine to a standstill using his patents, and only after these patents expired, innovation could continue:

Once Watt's patents were secured and production started, a substantial portion of his energy was devoted to fending off rival inventors. In 1782, Watt secured an additional patent, made "necessary in consequence of... having been so unfairly anticipated, by [Matthew] Wasborough in the crank motion"... . More dramatically, in the 1790s, when the superior Hornblower engine was put into production, Boulton and Watt went after him with the full force of the legal system.

...

After the expiration of Watt's patents, not only was there an explosion in the production and efficiency of engines, but steam power came into its own as the driving force of the Industrial Revolution. Over a thirty year period steam engines were modified and improved as crucial innovations such as the steam train, the steamboat and the steam jenny came into wide usage. The key innovation was the high-pressure steam engine — development of which had been blocked by Watt's strategic use of his patent. Many new improvements to the steam engine, such as those of William Bull, Richard Trevithick, and Arthur Woolf, became available by 1804: although developed earlier these innovations were kept idle until the Boulton and Watt patent expired. None of these innovators wished to incur the same fate as Jonathan Hornblower.

I recall when I went through a rather lengthy discussion with the UK government about software patents, and the state of the law. It became very clear that regarding patent law, the UK government and the UK patent office is very heavily influenced by advisors who are, almost to a man, commercial patent lawyers. The remaining industry spokesmen are from big business.

It doesn't take a huge amount of understanding or research to see that SME innovation has more or less been destroyed by the existing patent processes. Entry into big success is done through innovation still - but not so much via the patent route. I would contend that companies like Facebook was successful, NOT because of whatever patents they may have held, (or bought), but because they were able to identify a market demand and react to it faster or more successfully than existing big industry was able.

I just don't think he can effectively get his message across to Corporate/IT decision makers/leaders. Nor is the average computer user able to really recieve it. What do they "benefit" from his ideals.

For example, this quote in reference to 'Software as a Service'

"You absolutely can't study it, and you absolutely can't change it, and you're even further away from having control over your computing."

Corporations, don't particularly care about studying, and the idea of not having control over their computin

I would tell the corporate world that free software is good for the economy, and good for their business.

There are plenty of vendors out there who have built products on top of Linux, Apache, etc.

If Linux, Apache, etc. were not available for free, these vendors either would not have been able to launch their products, or would have paid huge licensing fees for crap like the Microsoft web server, driving up their prices.

If it weren't for these kinds of public software projects, everything would be more expensive, from consumer electronics to enterprise appliances.

In the past (and present) this is precisely what Richard Stallman did with GNU. He wanted software to be free. Instead of bootlegging copies of Windows (or MS-DOS) he created his OWN stuff and gave it away for free. Now Linux is a force to be reckoned with. If he had simply pirated other peoples' work, this innovation would have never happened.

But I'm curious about who you think is suggesting that people should infringe copyright?

Or are you talking about Stallman's anti-software-patent position? Newly imposing software patents is the "theft"; it takes stuff that should be in the public domain, and gives the patent holder a monopoly on it.

Copying other people's stuff and giving it away isn't "sharing." If you want to share, create your own work and give it away for free.

Let's say you have a car. You lend it to your friend.
Is that sharing? Yes.
Now let's say you have the ability to magically duplicate your car, and you give your friend a duplicate so when he needs it, you're not without a car.
Is that sharing? Yes, but in a different way.

So, you are still sharing something you have. Remember those "you wouldn't steal a car" ads? They were right, I wouldn't. But if I could get an exact copy such that the owner was not deprived of his car, I sure as hell would! Who wouldn't want a nice car for free?!

And before someone says that you'd kill the auto industry by not giving them their money for cars... open-source hasn't killed closed (yet). And then there's these guys [theoscarproject.org].

This is getting tangential, but... As I've argued before [slashdot.org], when a debate starts focusing on terminology, both parties need to step back ask why people are worried so much about the terminology. Typically it is because words have added emotional baggage or implications, that either side wants to subtly slip into the debate without actively addressing the point.

In this case, one side really wants to use the word "stealing" to be used, because of the emotional baggage of associated with it (it's wrong, it's bad, no one honest would do it,...). The other side wants to use the word "sharing" similarly (it's good, everyone is taught to share, no one is harmed,...).

But in an intellectually honest debate, both sides would willingly back off from contentious terminology, and use neutral terms and focus on the particulars. Regardless of whether distributing digital copies is "sharing" or "stealing" (or both, or neither), we should debate whether said distribution is a net gain for society. We should debate whether said distribution violates a party's basic rights. And then from those points, we should debate what law would be both fair and socially-helpful.

I fully acknowledge that words have meaning, and we should try to be precise with language. But this is exactly why an honest debate should not invoke terms with an intent to capitalize on ambiguity. My main point is not to let debate get derailed by terminology concerns. Focus on the nature and consequences of the activity being debated, rather than ambiguous labels or partial analogies.

In the case of copyright, it becomes very difficult to argue for the social necessity, and intrinsic justness, of very long-term and rigidly-enforced copyright when you can no longer draw a false analogy to stealing of physical property. Conversely, it becomes difficult to argue that copyright infringement is completely without harm once you remove the sharing rhetoric and focus on the incentive/social-contract aspect of copyright law. In other words, I believe a socially-constructive compromise is more likely to arise from that kind of honest debate (yes, I know how unrealistic it is to expect that kind of debate to actually happen).

Copying someone else's work and distributing it without permission or license for free, thus depriving the creator of income counts as theft in my book.

This is not what the FOSS movement is about and it's a shame that so many pirates hide behind the skirts of the Open Source movement to justify their actions. Even worse that so many FOSS supporters turn a blind eye to the practice rather than deal with it directly.

Given the number of corporate shills who show up at F/OSS conventions peddling things like, "'you people' need to get over software patents" or "sometimes you just can't just hand the source over to the client, its just good for business" or "I'm not calling you people communist -or even traitors, but you have to wonder about someone who doesn't genuinely care about the shareholder's position", I have no problem with Stallman shitting in their yard. Good for him.

The headline says "crashes".The article says "interrupted", but gives no details.The article has two pictures (#18 and #19).#19 looks like Stallman posing after the event for the benefit of the camera.#18 is probably the interruption.All you can see from the picture is that Stallman (and friend) stood at the front of a conference room holding poster-board signs.It looks like Stallman has a sheaf of papers in his hand, so maybe he said something.

Try Jedit. It was built with the same philosophy.The thing I like the most about it, is that I didn't had to learn a new language to script it (like elisp), it can be scripted with beanshell, which is pretty much like java, you just don't have to declare the type of everything (but it accepts vanilla Java too).It can record macros in Beanshell while clicking around, you can assign them to custom buttons, to custom hotkeys, it has a nice plugin api as well (but you can do everything in beanshell macro too, b